Sold
by Raicathre
Summary: A demon makes her prescence known in a tiny German village, and it's now down to the fabled monster hunter and his ever faithful friar assistant to track her down, but is her power too much even for the great Van Helsing?
1. A Cruel Business

Right, OK, I haven't been here in ages, I have two other stories, but what the Hell, I'll stick this one up. I'm no stranger to writing, but I'm not wonderful at it, alright? Tell me whether I should bother to continue. I will anyway, but you know, give us your opinions, preciousssss...

**Sold - ****Chapter 1**

Swaying rather too nervously for someone that had fought (tried to) alongside the great demon hunter, whose reputation preceded his physical arrival, Friar Carl rubbed the back of his neck as if it hurt him and stared at the wooden door before him, and mentally swore that it was staring right back.

He ran a hand through his blonde hair and breathed out deeply. He hadn't seen nor heard of Van Helsing since their return to the Vatican, and he had to admit, he had holed himself back up into his makeshift laboratory as soon as he clambered up the steps. That might have been a bit of a mistake on his part, though he hated to think it. Carl hadn't spoken to Van Helsing, because he feared to. Van Helsing may have been a friend, but he was quick to anger, and thought too much. That was his problem. People who thought too much ended up self-doubting and denying. It was a waste of time if anyone had bothered to ask someone like Carl.

"Alright Carl, there's absolutely nothing to this. He hasn't taken up a single mission since his return, he hasn't spoken to you for God knows how long, not even a note…or a card, but that's beside the point. You're going to go in there and talk to him, no matter the price. It depends on what the price actually is, but whatever it is, it doesn't matter. Carl, you talk to yourself far too often for it to remain just "weird" now. It's probably unhealthy. I suggest you stop." Carl listened to his inner conscience and ceased swaying nervously, straightened up to the best of his ability, ruffled his hair up a bit just to see if Van Helsing asked, and breathed out long and steadily.

He pushed against the heavy oak door and he was surprised to first of all find that it opened quite easily and secondly to see a silver, stream-lined stake come rushing past his ear. It whistled behind him and embedded itself into a tapestry on the far wall.

Carl's eyes widened and before he even dared look into Van Helsing's room, he silently closed the door and shut it. The catch clicked slowly and Carl stood there for a few seconds. The expression on his face was the same one that he had been wearing since opening the door.

He breathed deeply again, and this time, knocked. He pushed the door much in the same way that he had before, if a little more tentatively.

"Van Helsing?" he managed to breath. He closed his eyes tightly, as if he expected another stake to whirl past, this time though, maybe not make it past his head.

He opened one eye, and then the other when he saw that Van Helsing had the old crossbow that Carl had constructed himself, trained on his being.

"I'm sorry, I forgot I resemble a vampire, Van Helsing, are you completely insane?! You could have killed me!"

"What, and save the other monks from doing the job without my input?" came the snide reply.

"Friar…" Carl muttered.

"Well, you can't be too prepared for things like these. Strike at the headquarters, take him down when he sleeps, and spike his drinks. It's a cruel business," Van Helsing said with a laugh, checking the crossbow.

"Then I'd say you were too prepared, I'm hardly what you'd call a supernatural entity, now put that crossbow down before you break it," Carl sighed.

"Now Carl, I haven't broken a thing made by you since I met you, so _I'd _say you were too _worrisome_," Van Helsing answered brightly. He swung his feet up to rest them, one across the other, upon the table in front of him.

"Then it really is a cruel business if friends can point out their other friend's faults before their strengths," Carl shrugged, his voice rising a little too high for his own liking, let alone Van Helsing's.

"You alright there, _Carlene_?" he said with a sly grin.

Carl glared and straightened his robes matter-of-factly. If he had responded, they would have been at it all day. It hadn't turned out to be the most pleasant of meetings, but he had to say, the play-arguing hadn't changed a bit, and neither had Van Helsing's quick reactions.

"So Carl, what brings one of such high esteem, here?" Van Helsing asked with a smile after a pause. He rested the crossbow across his lap, but deliberately kept it pointed at the friar.

"Oh nothing at all, to be honest, I had to drag myself up here to see you, strange that…" Carl replied, pretending to think on it and take it seriously. He rolled his eyes; it had begun all over again as if his abrupt silence hadn't severed Van Helsing's greed for more bickering.

"Well then good monk, I will need you to leave while I ponder my next assignment," Van Helsing replied, cutting off Carl's last sentence and waving him off.

"Wait—you took on a new assignment? I heard that you had refused since—I'm not a monk…I'm still a--"

"Friar, yes I knew that. You heard wrong, and you won't be hearing anything else on it either, good day to you," Van Helsing answered with a frustrated growl.

"Why not? Surely you need me to invent something, supply you with something, help you with _something_?" Carl protested. How on earth could Van Helsing have ignored a friend's offer to help on another quest, or assignment, or mission? It made him more angered than hurt.

"Craving a bit more of that outdoor travelling? That death-defying adventure? That feeling of kill or be killed?" Van Helsing chided, throwing the crossbow onto his desk. It sent papers flying out from under it and float gently to the floorboards.

Carl winced as the crossbow fell with a clang, and promptly picked up the scattered notes.

"No, that's not what I said at all. I hated all of that ridiculous stuff you rattled off. I just want to help out a bit, and then get invited along for the ride," he answered, dropping in the implication in just the wrong place.

"You have no idea what the assignment entails and you want to get _invited_? You get funnier and funnier each day you spend away from me!" Van Helsing retorted.

"_I_ have no idea what turned you into a damned hypocrite!" Carl answered back, his voice rising, this time, louder than it was a second before.

"Cursing doesn't suit you, Carl. If you don't want to embarrass yourself, please, for the sake of the poor people around you, don't do it," Van Helsing replied calmly. He took his feet from the desk, showering more papers to the ground, and stood up. He dusted off his jacket and grabbed his long coat from the back of the chair where it hung.

Carl lowered his head in defeat, and flicked through the pages that he had managed to salvage, and noticed that between the drawings and diagrams, there was Van Helsing's mission statement. He read the first few lines to make sure that it was genuine, and eventually had to hide the grin that was crawling onto his features. There it was, in pure black and white. It was an invitation after all.

"Right, I'll stop, I'll be damned if I'm caught God damned cursing in front of you, why the Hell would I want to bloody curse anyway?" Carl answered, not even making eye contact with his…friend? Was he still a friend? Carl wanted to answer, "Yes" but Van Helsing's words and actions wanted him to answer differently. He'd think on it later. He hoped he wouldn't start thinking too much.

"Good," came the blunt reply.

Carl raised an eyebrow in confusion, but shrugged and tucked the papers inside his robes as inconspicuously as he could. He made for the door, and as he reached for the handle, a silver stake came hurtling towards his hand and ended up halfway through the wood, an inch away from his outstretched fingers.

"That still isn't funny," Carl stated emotionlessly. He grabbed the handle, threw open the door and slammed it behind him so roughly that he was suddenly afraid that he had ripped the door from its hinges.

"Can't be too prepared!" Van Helsing's voice sang behind the wooden blockade that Carl was now glad separated them both. It seemed as if Transylvania had completely changed Van Helsing, and not for the better. He was still the dark-under toned hunter, but he was now hunting nothing, and had become too dark even for his friends. Maybe it was the loss of Anna that had driven him to insanity. Insanity. Was that really the right word?

Carl shook the thoughts from his mind. Thinking too much, he reminded himself. He tugged at his hair slightly, and then folded his arms. He stormed off down the corridor, and when he came across that first silver stake, he wrapped his fingers around it and tugged until it freed itself from the wall. He stared at it for a second. This was the right word for Gabriel Van Helsing. He was just a silver stake that flew on one course, and didn't care what he hit and who got in the way.

"Damnit Carl, you got in the way," he murmured to himself, and he let the stake slide from his palm. It clattered upon the flagstones and rolled away with a steady hum.

He started to walk back to his quarters, the walk turned into a swift jog, and then transformed wholly into a near-panicked sprint. He ran as if Van Helsing himself was on his tail. Winding through the twisting corridors of the Vatican at such a speed would have confused anyone, but no-one knew the huge halls and narrow alley-like corridors like Carl did, or even saw them the way Carl did either.

He turned another corner and sped down another hallway, and when he reached the hall where his quarters were located, he slowed his pace right down to a meandering stroll. He turned the final corner and saw the familiar oak door in its old worn frame. He rolled his eyes with impatience and sighed with relief that he could catch his breath when he sat down.

He approached the door and rattled the handle. His eyebrows met in a confused frown and he shoved against the door. After many failed attempts to wrench it open, he yelled and banged his fist on the old slab of wood that was obstructing his passage.

He sensed motion behind him. When one was as permanently nervous and flustered as Carl, he knew what moved behind him and immediately calculated how it could kill him.

"Cardinal," he stated blandly, "my door appears to be locked,"

"That is what you do when you leave your room, is it not? I'm sure every other patron here does the same," the Cardinal replied with humour rising in his voice.

"Not me, sir. If I lock a door I usually walk away from it with the key in my pocket, not nowhere to been seen, sir," Carl replied, feeling slightly exasperated now.

"I locked your door, young Carl, so that I could talk to you here before you stormed into that room and disappear from sight and sound before the dawn," the Cardinal answered. Carl turned around and leaned against the door, his arms folded and a frown across his features.

"Now, Carl, could I trust you to do something for me? I want to conduct a meeting, just me and you, tomorrow at the eleventh stroke," the Cardinal said, without looking or even acknowledging Carl to see whether he was even listening. He presumed he was.

"I'm not in trouble am I?" Carl shot back, his frown more worried than frustrated.

"Why, have you done something troublesome?" the Cardinal said with a sly smile.

"Not at all, sir," Carl laughed, trying not to stumble over his own words.

"Good, then I will see you tomorrow," the Cardinal said with a blunt scowl. He reached into his robes and produced the small bronze key, a number indented into the side.

"I suggest you take more care when you lock your door next time, I don't want to see that lying on the floor ever again," he announced, throwing the key in the air, and with one sweeping motion, he floated away, drifting above the flagstones it seemed.

Carl resisted the urge to make an indecent hand gesture at the receding figure of the Cardinal, but thought maybe God was watching.

God. There was someone Carl hadn't reckoned deeply about for a time now. God would forgive him though; he was that sort of chap after all. He shrugged and slid the key that the Cardinal had thrown to him into the lock. Turning it to the left and then pushing on the door, he was thankful that it opened, and that the Cardinal hadn't given him the wrong key. He didn't recall dropping it at anytime during the day. The sneaky old man must have taken it from him whilst he was busy pounding on the door.

For someone who was only one person most of the time, Carl's room was extremely messy. There were books everywhere, to be expected of course, but they were strewn across any available surface. Some were half open, some balancing uncomfortably on their spines, and more than often, a large amount missing pages.

The room itself was pleasant enough in the layout, and surprisingly was absent of anything holy, and filled with more things unholy. Images, drawings, some by Carl's own hand, were pinned to the walls depicting monstrous creatures with or without vicious sounding names. Half-finished inventions and old experiments were placed carelessly across the books that were covering every inch of wooden table or desk. There was one window. A tall one which was in the typical design that was common in the Vatican. It was as tall as an arch, but Carl had thrown across the shutters and used it as a makeshift wall, more drawings and maps posted along the length and breadth.

Stepping carefully around the room so as not to stand on any papers, books or weapons in some cases, Carl made his way to his main desk. He looked down his nose at the mess lying over it, and shoved half of it out of the way. He ignored the dull thuds as one by one books cascaded over the edges like a solid waterfall, and sat down in the space he had made. The chair that used to reside under the desk had been employed to keep the shutters from springing open and also to balance a few stacks of books at the same time.

Carl breathed out and then searched his inner pockets for those papers he had stolen, no, borrowed, from Van Helsing and when he found them, uncurled the corners and laid them out flat against his knee.

His eyes flew across the sentences, and he wished that he could take it all in at once, that way he could discover what this assignment was in a faster time. He turned the pages over; it was all legalities that he already knew about. Where was that one page that he had spotted earlier? He had definitely taken it. Maybe the Cardinal…? No. That was a preposterous idea, why on earth would the old man with the colourful robes take the page from him? It was none of his business. Then again, it was none of Carl's business either. He flicked through the pages once again, becoming a little desperate to find the right one. He could feel the low thumping of his own heartbeat grow faster and faster as he almost ripped the pages scanning them.

Odd then that the one that had given him a paper cut across the thumb was the one he had been looking for. The Cardinal hadn't removed it from his being at all, it was there all along.

His heartbeat quickened and it took several shallow attempts at breathing properly to steady it. He read the first few lines, some more boring legal things, it was all set out in an odd way, and it took a while for him to get used to it, but when he read the mission statement at the bottom, printed in bold, it didn't take long for him to understand it at all.

"Van Helsing, what the Hell have you got yourself into this time?" he breathed through his teeth.

It was a cruel business, indeed.


	2. Of Fire And Ice

Right, here's the second chapter! Gotta say thanks for the nice reviews I got for the first one! Thanks! This one went through A LOT of editing, and I'm still not completely sure I like it, but so is life! .

**Sold - Chapter 2**

The next morning, Carl removed the dark thoughts that had been lurking in the back of his mind during the night. It was still the waking hours, and the only light now in the room was the thin shaft of light that had pushed through a gap in the shutters.

Falling asleep in the clothes that he had been wearing last night, robes and cowl too, may not have been particularly comfortable, but it was easy to see why plenty of people sometimes don't mind making the mistake.

He stood up abruptly, sending more papers and books sliding in more than direction, and peered through half-closed eyes at what parts of the room he could see under the mountainous mess.

Kicking away a few stray books that lay right under his feet, Carl made his careful way to the door. He leaned against it until it opened itself, and he stumbled out into the hallway. It would have been much more to his liking if the hallways had been carpeted. He was sure that he must have woken someone else up already after just a few steps.

"You could wake the dead, Brother Carl!" a voice shouted on the left behind a door, only just ajar.

"Good morning to you too," Carl replied with little enthusiasm. He rubbed his chin and then continued to try and smooth his hair down a little. He ended up ruffling it too much and it stood almost on end.

His eyes now were fully adjusted to the half-light filtering into the hall. His pace quickened and became more stable and balanced.

His first thought was the one that had fluttered back to the night before. He stopped sharp with a strangled yelp. Was what he had read true? He turned about and rushed back to his room. It seemed like an endless journey but when he finally reached the door, briefly cursing when he saw that he hadn't locked it, and entered the room, he didn't like the prospect of searching about for that one slip of paper he was so concerned with.

He frantically threw aside anything that got in the way, and began re-enacting the scene last night. How could just a piece of paper go missing twice? It was like it had a mind of its own.

The creatures stared down at him from their paper prisons and silently mocked him, as Carl could feel every pair of eyes on him. He rummaged through a clump of papers the size of a small dog, and found it. He turned it over and made sure it was the correct one.

"Thank God…" he muttered under his breath. He stood up and slid it into his robes. He brushed the dust that had already begun to collect on his shoulders away and watched it all dance in the light. The place was a tip, but it was a loveable tip, he thought, turning on his heel and this time making sure that the door was locked when he closed it behind him.

…………………………………………………………………

Rushing into that crowded laboratory once again and making his way to the long bench where he usually set up everything, Carl tripped over the steps and got tangled in some wiring that he knew wasn't there yesterday.

It cause a slightly painful knot in his stomach to make its presence known, but he ignored it and leaned over his desk, staring at the various experiments lying in every possible space. His untidiness followed him like a ghost it seemed.

Carl picked up the jar that held his most recent work. It was heavy, not the jar, but what was contained inside it. It was black powder, with a dull silver sheen. He'd been reminded with a laugh that gunpowder had been invented years ago, and he had retorted that it wasn't gunpowder, but was still very _powderful_. Carl smiled at his own little joke that had put down the other that had tried to insult him.

He shook the jar, turned it upside down and then slammed it back down onto the bench. He knew what it did, just not how to activate it. It needed some sort of reaction. He thought it was maybe motion, but that had been proven wrong. He glared at it for a few seconds more and then sighed. He then frowned. Maybe it needed cooling or something?

Carl picked it up again and nearly threw it into the tiny cabinet that he had packed with ice months before. It wasn't the best way to go about an experiment, but it had worked before. It was in the coldest corner of the lab, besides the whole place being partially underground anyway.

Rubbing his hands to try and reawaken the senses in them, he made his way back to the bench and sat down. He rested his head on his clasped hands and frowned once again.

"Bored, Carl?" a sudden voice called over to him. Carl spun around to see the rather formidable figure of Brother Franklin. He was a huge man, and the sort that Carl would least have expected join the order.

"Most probably," Carl replied slowly, still taking in the image of Franklin with his tired eyes.

"Finished throwing that gunpowder around, have you? Franklin laughed, leaning forward. Far too closely for Carl's liking, but he remained unmoving.

"I found the solution, don't you worry," he answered brightly, a smile beginning to play across his face.

"Don't be coy with me, Blondie; you're a sneaky little blighter and I don't like sneaky," Franklin spat, leaning back again and storming away.

"Well I don't like you either," Carl murmured, folding his arms on the table and resting his chin on them, an unbecoming scowl on his face.

"Right, I want some nice hell hound repellent, demon remover and a cloth!" A stern voice suddenly yelled, making Carl and almost all of the others working start with fright.

"What's the cloth for?" someone piped up.

"This," Van Helsing said darkly and threw his coat at the little man who had spoken. He squeaked in disgust when he saw the drool literally dripping from the sleeves and dangling threateningly over his own.

Carl would have usually thrown whatever Van Helsing had meant by "hell hound repellent and demon remover" at him, but today he'd rather the great Gabriel Van Helsing get it himself.

"I'm sorry, did you not hear me?" Van Helsing's voice was extremely close, and Carl knew that he was right behind him, and his fears were confirmed when he was dragged to his feet by his hood. There was humour in Van Helsing's eyes, and Carl saw that it was just a joke, but somehow it didn't feel like one.

"I thought you had only taken on one assignment?" he said, changing the subject hurriedly.

"Well, this was just a practice, get me back into the swing of things before I go to Germany," Van Helsing answered, straightening his collar and beaming.

"What was it?" Carl asked nervously. Judging by the amount of saliva on that coat of his, it was big.

"Ah it was nothing short of the usual, black dogs hemmed me in down in a street. I smashed their skulls, broke a few jawbones, but I still managed to get slobbered, what are the odds?" Van Helsing laughed, clapping Carl on the shoulder roughly.

"You certainly have a way with the animals," Carl replied with a weak smile.

"Before they get their way with me, you mean?" Van Helsing grinned and hit Carl across the back of the head playfully.

"Where did they come from? How many?" Carl said after a pause, and after the miniscule headache had subsided. Despite hating to know all the gory details, he was interested to know how they were defeated, just in case he encountered something and had no Van Helsing to jump in and save his sorry skin.

"Well, the complaints from the farms on the outskirts suggested about two or three. Then we find that a Barghest had entered the city and preyed on travellers in dark alleyways. We couldn't be having that, so I investigated," Van Helsing explained rapidly.

"And by investigating you mean…"

"Slicing their throats, bringing down their corpses down onto the road, showering supernatural blood everywhere…" Van Helsing mused.

"Right, well you go and get ready for that arduous trip to Germany," Carl said, waving Van Helsing off and giving him a shove and a kick in the shins, just to make sure he actually left.

Carl glanced over to that cupboard that he had placed the jar in earlier. He pondered whether he could take it out now and see whether it had worked.

"What the Hell," Carl muttered with a shrug, and, making sure that Van Helsing wasn't in the vicinity, stumbled over to the cabinet and opened the door. He touched the glass, and then made a few swift calculations before giving it a nudge and catching it before it fell.

It was freezing, so damn cold that Carl nearly dropped it. He backed up, still staring at the powder, a colour change reaction could have occurred, but nothing seemed to have happened in the way of a physical change.

Unfortunately, he backed right in Franklin, and the force that Franklin shoved him at in response caused the jar to fly from Carl's fingers and land right where the swords were being hammered into shape. The intense heat couldn't have done any good to the glass, let alone what was inside it. When it fell, the whole jar shattered and the ringing of the glass echoed around the chamber. A spark from one of the hammers skittered across the worktable and to Carl's utter surprise, set the powder alight.

Carl had a feeling of despair that he had in fact just recreated gunpowder, but after a few seconds, the fire flared up and started to smoulder quietly. A few more seconds and a huge flame reached to the ceiling, licking at the rafters and dancing to its own tune. It was a bright green and almost blinding.

A howling that began as a low whine then grew louder into a hum, and then into unbearable screeching, rang through the chamber now. The fire was singing that noise, as there were no windows for animals to be heard from.

"Unbelievable," someone commented, and as quickly as the fire rushed up to its great height, it shrank at an alarming rate and the powder smouldered quietly to itself once again.

All eyes were on Carl now, and the expressions worn ranged from utter disbelief to ugly scowls.

"I don't think that was supposed to happen…" Carl began. He raised his hands in mock surrender and had a try at an innocent smile.

Midway through his sentence, the remaining black ash that started as powder exploded, the bang deafening and sending sparks all on its own cascading down into the entire lab, setting almost anything made of cloth, or hair, alight.

That was entirely the wrong reaction; it was supposed to keep away demons and hounds from Hell. A fire surely wouldn't keep the creatures away. It was more of an explosion of fireworks than a fire, and a pretty display of colour may even draw the demons closer, not ward them off.

He'd have to try it all over again. The powder looked non-reusable, and so the pain-staking hunt for the proper ingredients would have to begin again.

He opened his mouth to further his apologies, but he was interrupted by the clanging of a distant bell. The sound drifted in from an open window on the above landing, no doubt.

There was complete astounded silence around the lab, movement was restrained and expressions hadn't changed in some cases.

"Look, I didn't expect that anymore than you did!" Carl said with a weak laugh as everyone patted out tiny fires that had caught around the room.

It was then that he had heard the final toll of the bell. Had it counted to ten or eleven? Carl prayed to God silently that it had counted up to ten.

"It's eleven, let's get outta here before we get fried by another failed experiment!" announced Franklin, and even he had to hold onto something as the rest unruly and desperately pushed past each other to file out and remove their prescence from the chamber, under threat of another explosion.

Franklin hung back and smirked at Carl with a knowing look, and Carl had to look twice, as he saw that fire burning in Franklin's eyes as well as crackling over by the smithy.

"I don't know how this could get any worse…" Carl said to the empty room. He took one step out onto the stairs that led up and out, and knew it was going to be a long walk to the Cardinal's meeting.

…………………………………………………………

"Dare I say that you have become…a bit of a liability?"

"A liability? No, no, you've got that wrong, I'm far from it. I helped out your fabled hunter!"

Using Van Helsing as an excuse to wriggle out of trouble really made Carl squirm inside, but it was all he could do to call his defence in front of the Cardinal.

"You blaspheme, you constantly end up destroying something, you are breaking so many rules that you are unaware of, probably because you haven't read them," the Cardinal said, heaving himself to his feet and pacing slowly.

"I know I'm not exactly…"

"I know what you are not, you are not really the type that we can handle around here," the Cardinal cut in, with a knife it felt like.

"Now sir, that is entirely unnecessary," Carl shot back, "I was going to say that I'm not exactly built for somewhere like here, but I will persevere to work a little on my carelessness if you are prepared to give me a second chance…"

"Do you know how many second chances I have given to you since your first arrival here, Carl?" the Cardinal said, with a hint of annoyance rising in his voice.

"I wouldn't know, sir…" Carl said with a confused stare.

"You wouldn't know because they meant nothing to you, did they? Oh good, another second chance, you thought. I have counted every single one that I have let you have. They total to seventeen. Seventeen second chances, Carl." The Cardinal stated gravely.

"But sir, you can't honestly be thinking of…" Carl said with a pathetic expression.

"I am so very close to thinking exactly that, young monk…"

"I'm still a friar, sir,"

"Really? I thought…no matter. I think maybe a suspension from your duties would force you to turn around?" the Cardinal concluded with a wave of his hand.

"It's not as if I am doing anything serious, sir!" Carl protested, his voice rising up a few octaves.

"You don't call burns and fractures, caused by your experiments, serious? You will kill someone one day," the Cardinal replied solemnly. He sat back down behind his tidy desk and waited for Carl's reaction.

"And if it weren't for today, if I hadn't set off that explosion, if this part of the meeting hadn't taken place…what did you call me in for?" Carl replied, leaning forward across the desk and resting his elbows on the edges.

"I was going to tell you that I don't want you involving yourself with Mr. Van Helsing's business. Transylvania was a one off to keep you out of the way, so to speak." The Cardinal said with a smile twitching its way onto his lips.

"Oh no you don't, I was invaluable on that trip! If you were a sane man, you'd tell me to pack my bags and be ready to leave tomorrow at dawn, that way you'd get rid of me again!" Carl said, scaring himself slightly that he had the nerve to object to the Cardinal's plans.

"Oh you'll be kept away whether you go on that journey or not," the Cardinal answered serenely. He stood up once again and crossed the room, opening the door and indicating Carl's leaving of his office.

Carl got up and took a while to straighten his robes, all a deliberate action. He always thought the Cardinal a twisted man. He'd always disliked him. It was difficult to tell when he was being serious, or just joking. He certainly wasn't joking at this moment in time.

"You are light-haired and light-headed, young Carl, you have a wonderful talent for ruining things. In the future, try and be a little more careful," the Cardinal stated with a slight sneer, but a cheerful, sarcastic smile.

What the Cardinal didn't realize was that Carl would try as hard as he could to get out of the Vatican, even if that meant travelling with Van Helsing, and looking forward to a very silent journey, if he did.


End file.
